OK, so there are times when I am not the sharpest tool in the shed. For years I have been growing snow peas, climbing beans, cucumbers etc up a number of moveable trellises that were leant up against the nearest fence. They were not secured very well and the frame was made from 20mm x 43mm DAR pine which is cheap and easy to work as well as being light enough to move around easily. The interior mesh is 25mm galvanised wire mesh, recycled from when we had a wire mesh fence around the veggie patches so at least it was sustainably sourced.
The trouble is that I didn’t have enough, which made it difficult in the peak growing period and in the cooler months they sat there.......and rotted so that the next summer I had to keep repairing them. I really needed trellises that were permanently in place and were robust enought to stand up to the weather. After all I have been doing this for over 25 years. Time to take action!
We have veggie patches against the north, south and west fences, so I decided to make heavy duty fixed trellises along the south and west fences, where most of the growing space is. They would have to be robust enough to stand up to the weather and sourced from sustainable, recycled materials.
Luckily enough, the mob up the end of our road decided to get rid of some 5 and 6 metre lengths of 38mm x 90mm construction timber. They just sat it outside their house with a “free” sign on it. So I carried 5 lengths of it, plus a couple of 2 metre or so lengths of 100mm x 100mm stuff to use as uprights. I had the wire still floating around on top of the shed, so today was it.
I measured up and designed it to run across two veggie beds and be attached to the west fence. I cut the 38 x 90 to size as two cross pieces using my circular saw, and before you yell “Cheat!” it was run through an inverter from the 12 volt system. I could have used a hand saw.............but I get impatient.
Using the circular saw, I cut a slot 90mm from the top of the uprights and two slots 90mm apart near the bottom of the uprights. Using a 25mm chisel and mallet I released my frustrations on the inoffensive timber and created two slots to take the top and bottom crosspieces. Feeling much better now I dragged it all out onto the back lawn for assembly. The crosspieces fitted into the uprights remarkably well, only needing the merest of persuasion from the rubber hammer.
I then secured them with a coach bolt in each corner, and applied a strut in the centre made out of the 38 x 90 by the same means. The wire mesh was then secured by stapling them to the frame, hammering in a 12mm staple every 30cm or so. Once complete I found out just how solid this thing was, it was bloody heavy! I was only just able to lift it into position by myself, the mesh in my hernia repairs paid for itself today.....
I secured it to the fence with a couple of galvanised steel straps left over from a previous project and there you have it! I had built one for the south fence and liked it, so I built this one and even Linda said she liked the look of it. It now has snow peas planted at the base, so we will hopefully get a good crop this year.
